Waymo Blames Human Driver For Self-Driving Taxi Screw Up

Waymo's self-driving cabs keep running into trouble as the company shifts gears into wider regional expansion. Merely days after one of its autonomous cars was spotted driving on a light rail track in Phoenix, another incident of erroneous driving behavior has emerged from Denver, Colorado. As per a 9News report, the situation involves a Waymo car that was parked in a bike lane.

In a statement shared with the outlet, Waymo clarified that the car was being driven by a human specialist when it was spotted parked there. In Denver, parking in a bike lane is deemed a violation of traffic laws, and tickets are issued to the person behind the wheel. The city is enforcing these rules pretty strictly, and to discourage such behavior, the fine for blocking bike lanes was more than doubled back in 2022.

It's such a problem in the city that these violations could amount to millions of dollars in tickets. In fact, 9News reported that Denver was projected to collect an additional $6.4 million with the new fines in 2022. The latest case involving a Waymo taxi is no exception, and local authorities have expressed intent to issue a ticket for the parking rule offense.

So far, it hasn't been confirmed why exactly the car was parked in the bike lane. Nevertheless, a human driver behind the wheel of a Waymo self-driving car is not an unexpected event. Prior to widespread deployment or during the test phase, these cars drive around the region to map routes with a human in the driver's seat. "These specialists are there to monitor our autonomous driving technology and share important feedback to help us improve the Waymo experience," explains the company. 

This isn't the first incident of its kind, and the company has had its fair share of hiccups. The company recently attracted some criticism for driving over pets. Meanwhile, Uber and Lyft drivers also came out to protest self-driving cars. 

In September 2025, a video in which a Waymo car was seen driving on a golf course was also widely shared. In response to the video, Waymo posted on X that it was a "human-driven car" and that it was getting ready for an event at the golfing venue. Still, Waymo maintains that its self-driven taxi service is safer than human drivers and has clocked over 100 million miles on public streets so far.